You all are dealing in terms of "consciousness" and "unconsciousness." If an electroencephalogram says that you are "unconscious," then you are by definition unconscious. Consciousness, linguistically, is simply a measure of brainwave frequencies. It is blatantly oxymoronic nonsense to say that "the machine read me as unconscious, but I was conscious." (Even if you could somehow know when exactly you were conscious and the machine "read you as unconscious.") Specialist anesthesiologists tailor exhaustive plans of action specifically for various patients, and then work methodically with a variety of drugs to ease you slowly down into lower brainwave frequencies until you are totally oblivious of everything. It's not like they simply flick a switch and you're immediately unconscious. That's dangerous. There is plenty of space in all that progression to account for some hypnagogic feedback to be experienced. I would be very concerned if a technical physician failed at effectively administering sedation during surgery, allowing you to not only dream but lucid dream during a procedure

"Empty cognizance of one taste, suffused with knowing, is your unmistaken nature, the uncontrived original state. when not altering what is, allow it to be as it is, and the awakened state is right now spontaneously present."

deschainXIX wrote:You all are dealing in terms of "consciousness" and "unconsciousness." If an electroencephalogram says that you are "unconscious," then you are by definition unconscious. Consciousness, linguistically, is simply a measure of brainwave frequencies. It is blatantly oxymoronic nonsense to say that "the machine read me as unconscious, but I was conscious." (Even if you could somehow know when exactly you were conscious and the machine "read you as unconscious.") Specialist anesthesiologists tailor exhaustive plans of action specifically for various patients, and then work methodically with a variety of drugs to ease you slowly down into lower brainwave frequencies until you are totally oblivious of everything. It's not like they simply flick a switch and you're immediately unconscious. That's dangerous. There is plenty of space in all that progression to account for some hypnagogic feedback to be experienced. I would be very concerned if a technical physician failed at effectively administering sedation during surgery, allowing you to not only dream but lucid dream during a procedure

Trouble with this argument is that we don't KNOW what causes consciousness. After all how do you explain people who have been in Coma saying they could hear their doctors, friends and family talking to them? Again instruments are not specific enough to make these sweeping claims you have made.

Is Lucid Dreaming the brains preparation for the next step of human evolution when we can escape the corporeal bond of our bodies?

Trouble with this argument is that we don't KNOW what causes consciousness. After all how do you explain people who have been in Coma saying they could hear their doctors, friends and family talking to them? Again instruments are not specific enough to make these sweeping claims you have made.

The brain creates consciousness. What we are yet to figure out is how. And we are already getting some clues. and in case you have missed it, I have already offered a very plausible explanation on the previous page when I was discussing with nesgirl her very experience.

And the instruments that do not dig deep enough are those of hospitals. Hence the term "no detectable brain activity." In the lab, it is a different story as all sorts of cerebral reverberations can be measured. Again, you surprise me as a scientist. You should know this already.

@ nesgirl:

Explain then how some people are able to dream about their surgeries DURING their surgeries, I am not the only one. They may not be Lucid Dreams then, and be just ordinary dreams, but they can still be dreams and possibly be controlled anyways. See my cousin was able to dream while having her wisdom teeth removed. Peter had many dreams during his. And other people have had surgery dreams.

If someone has suffered a trauma insofar as the near-death impact goes, and, in the process of coming to consciously dreams up an afterlife where the accident is remembered, it is not surprising for the brain to concoct a schema where the individual is being fixed in a hospital. Hence, the surgery hallucination that happens to coincide with the logical scenario of doctors battling to save the patient in reality.

You can also explain something to me: Why is it that no experienced out-of-body traveller has gone on a show like that of James Randi and proved once and for all that out-of-body states, in their literal sense, really do occur? All they have to do is have an OOBE, observe a number in the real world that is physically out of sight of the subject, successfully repeat the experiment to rule out coincidence, and at the end of which they can claim the one million dollars on offer.

Not to mention before I woke up from consciousness in both situations, I could tell exactly which side of me the doctor was on. Before I lost consciousness during the EEG, the doctor was on my right side. After I regained it, he was on my left side, and I knew instinctively to look on my left side.

Oh, come on!

Your unconscious brain received sound waves from a particular direction. Vestibular and proprioceptive data was recorded before being reported to consciousness at the time when this one arose (you came to). You are still not taking into account my plausible explanation and seem to be biased by buildit's afterlife fantasy. Also, how many times the doctor moved back and forth, left to right and vice versa during the op...

"Empty cognizance of one taste, suffused with knowing, is your unmistaken nature, the uncontrived original state. when not altering what is, allow it to be as it is, and the awakened state is right now spontaneously present."

Summerlander wrote:And the instruments that do not dig deep enough are those of hospitals. Hence the term "no detectable brain activity." In the lab, it is a different story as all sorts of cerebral reverberations can be measured. Again, you surprise me as a scientist. You should know this already.

So yes equipment will vary, however, in general a hospitals equipment must meet a minimum level of detection. So for most "deaths" in hospitals or operating rooms we must look at the minimum. A. body stops breathing on it's own B. Heart stops beating on it's own and C. body become unresponsive to any external stimuli. Like with all detection based science you must ask, "How small is zero and can we detect it". In terms of the macro observable "death" we are much more confident than when dealing with laboratory death.

Is Lucid Dreaming the brains preparation for the next step of human evolution when we can escape the corporeal bond of our bodies?

We are also confident that the living can become unconscious when there is measurable brain activity. It is also worth remembering that potent but slow brain waves do not generate consciousness, but, frequent (albeit weak) ones do.

"Empty cognizance of one taste, suffused with knowing, is your unmistaken nature, the uncontrived original state. when not altering what is, allow it to be as it is, and the awakened state is right now spontaneously present."